The Darkest Corner
by amiddle
Summary: This story has now been published in Shelf Life, a charity anthology in memory of Dr Who author Craig Hinton. Contact me directly for a link.
1. Chapter 1

Tegan Jovanka ran her hands across the cracked and pitted surface of the control console. Scarred by its exertions in the distant future, the lopsided and fragmented casing that once protected fragile time crystals lay bare and unmoving amid the jury-rigged bundle of wires and bladamite tubes that had bypassed its systems and brought the ship to safety.

The TARDIS was in a sorry state and the Doctor, fretting and picking over bare circuits, didn't look much better.

'Are you sure this thing is safe?' She asked as the Doctor pulled his hand away from a jumping spark and sucked at his fingertips.

'For now, Tegan,' said the Doctor. He circled the console, placing an arm around her shoulder and guiding her away from danger. 'Now we've set her down, the old girl can get some much deserved rest and recuperation.'

'Rest and recuperation?' Another voice interrupted. It was Turlough. Young, smart, and as cynical as ever. 'From the looks of it, the TARDIS needs major surgery.' He paused for effect. 'A transplant, even.'

Tegan felt the Doctor tense for a moment, before squeezing her arm reassuringly. 'The transplant's already been taken care of, Turlough.'

'What sort of transplant?' He asked.

'You might call it a… a matter transplant. The TARDIS didn't have enough mass to survive another turbulent trip through the vortex, so I had to bulk her up a little.'

'Bulk her up?' Tegan frowned. 'It's not exactly a chicken, Doctor.'

'That's true,' the Time Lord smiled, 'but the analogy is sound.' It was good to see him relax again, if only for a few moments. 'When we left New Alexandria I locked on to the surface and materialised one of the TARDIS rooms around a few miles of barren landscape. All we need to do now is park up and let her digest it.'

'How does a TARDIS digest a landscape?' Turlough asked. He was obviously in one of his wind-the-Doctor-up moods. 'And won't the people of New Alexandria miss it?'

'Ah,' the Doctor, as usual, deflected the swipe with an enthusiastic explanation. 'It was an abandoned and polluted part of the planet. Devoid of life, and better off being processed by the TARDIS than left to continue damaging the environment.'

'That's handy,' said Tegan, lightening the mood still further. 'Have you ever thought of doing the same to King's Cross?'

'Tegan!' The Doctor looked at her with mock-reproval. 'Remind me to book you on a tour of Camden in 2020, I think you'll find they solve those problems without our help.'

'So,' she played a straight face, 'where are we again?'

'Where we were meant to be all along. The Eye of Orion. One of the most stable places in the galaxy. Good for the mind and body, too.'

'Right, well,' Tegan could see that the Doctor clearly wanted them out of the way while he conducted repairs. 'What do we need to take?'

'That rather depends what you want to do. There are ruins to explore, berries to pick, fields to roam through.'

'Fields? I've always fancied myself as a bit of a Van Gogh.'

'Really, Turlough?' The Doctor looked sceptical. 'Well, if you're serious I have some artist materials you can use. I tried painting in my last body, but visiting the likes of Monet, L'Autrec and Picasso was more distraction than inspiration. There was always something more exciting to do. Ah, well.'

He fished a key out of his pocket – the key to his study, handing it to Turlough with brief instructions. Pads and canvasses by the easel, brushes in a toolbox, paints in the portmanteau. The Doctor was rarely so free with access to his private quarters. Nyssa had been the last to get that particular honour.

'What about you, Tegan?' He asked after Turlough had left the room.

'What about me? Every time we try to relax we end up chasing each other's tails.'

'Not this time. We've already arrived, and I can guarantee no predators, corrupt governments, invasion forces, salesmen or mad scientists. Even the atmosphere has a feel-good factor. You'll be fine. Have a wander, its perfectly safe out there.'

'Perfectly safe?' Where had she heard _that_ before? 'Eighteenth century France was supposed to be safe, and thirteenth century England before that. Let's face it, you haven't got the best track record.'

The Doctor reached across to flick one of the few intact switches on the central console, and the view screen flickered into life, displaying a rolling country view that wouldn't have looked out of place in the Yorkshire dales. Except for a very faint purple haze in the distance.

'There, look,' he said. 'Grass, hills, serenity.'

'You're absolutely sure?'

'Sure as rain,' he smiled.

'Oh, great. It's going to rain!' She teased, waiting for the Doctor's mouth to drop. Then she grinned. 'I suppose it's safer out there than it is in here. I could get a book from what's left of the library. Do you have any F Scott Fitzgerald?'

'Almost certainly…' the Doctor began.

'Right,' she said, turning on her heels and leaving the room, 'see you in a bit.'


	2. Chapter 2

With Tegan gone, the Doctor turned to his third companion. Sitting in a chair set against the far wall of the control room, Kamelion had stayed silent and unmoving throughout the exchange, watching. Waiting for guidance.

'Do you wish me to escort them outside?' he said at last, picking up on the Doctor's surface thoughts.

'What?' the Doctor looked sadly across at the android. 'No. They're fine. That was a stray thought. I can keep them out of the way by moving the rooms around a little.'

Brushing some debris aside, the Doctor reached into the guts of one of the control panels and pulled out a fractured keypad.

'There,' he declared a few moments later, 'that should do it. As for you,' he turned back to Kamelion, 'you're coming with me.'

'Where?' The android stood, tilting his head towards the Doctor. There was a snap as he retracted the umbilical cord that connected him to a junction box set into the TARDIS wall before following him out of the room.

'Somewhere safe.' The Doctor said, turning into a newly-crafted corridor that hadn't been there when Tegan and Turlough had walked past. 'Far from manipulative thoughts.'

Kamelion noted the new architecture as he followed the Doctor. Clean, white corridors much like those he had seen when he first came aboard. Before Lassiter had taken control of him. Before…

'Here we are,' the Doctor announced, pausing in front of a closed door at the end of the corridor. There were no locks or handles, just a solitary roundel set into its white surface. Reaching forwards, the Doctor placed his palm flat against the roundel, and the door glowed faintly before fading away to reveal what lay beyond.

Before them lay a dark, starless vista. Far bigger than any of the rooms Kamelion had seen before, it more closely resembled the surface of a planet that had no sky.

'What is this place, Doctor?'

'I think I'll call it "The Blue Room",' said the Time Lord, stepping over the threshold. 'It's new.'

'New?' Passing through the doorway, Kamelion found himself stepping out from the side of a mountain, looking down upon the scattered remains of an advanced civilisation. There was a broken dome, an impressive rampart, and countless ash-covered spires and minarets in various states of decay.

'New Alexandria, actually,' the Doctor explained at last. 'Well, part of it.'

By Kamelion's estimation – far more accurate than that of a fallible human – the original landscape would have covered eight or ten times the surface area that lay before them.

'This is the landscape you were telling Tegan and Turlough about?'

'Yes, but it's more than just a landscape.'

'It's a city.'

'Not a city,' the Doctor shook his head. '_The_ City. The Capitol. All that remains of the Time Lords.'

'I don't understand.' Kamelion was confused. The Capitol was the legendary home of the Time Lords. An impregnable fortress hidden on ancient Gallifrey. Not New Alexandria.

The Doctor set off towards the ruins, picking his way through rocks and debris toward the outer perimeter of the broken dome. He beckoned for Kamelion to follow him, and the android gingerly complied, marvelled by the remnants of ancient designs and at the ruins of a civilisation that had survived, unchanged, for millions of years.

'When we were brought to the Crystal Bucephalus I was pulled out of synch with my home world,' said the Doctor, pulling himself up and over a short wall and onto the intricately carved paving that covered the abandoned city streets. 'My Personal Relative Time and my Gallifreyan Mean Time have been seriously compromised. New Alexandria _is_ Gallifrey. It's a part of a future I should never have seen.'

'Why not?' The Doctor had not talked about these things with Kamelion before.

'When a Time Lord travels into his own future, or the future of Gallifrey, he can't go back. The Laws of Time forbid it.'

'Why?' Until now, Kamelion had been satisfied with unquestioning servitude. Rules – like the Laws of Time – were simply rules. The android had never considered asking why, having been freed from the Master, the Doctor couldn't take him home. He just accepted that it was how it was.

'Because once you've seen the future…'

Kamelion understood. 'The present becomes the past.'

'Precisely. Except here, in this future, there are no Laws of Time. The Time Lords appear to have abandoned Gallifrey, and what's left of the old Capitol is in ruins.'

'Is it safe?'

'To you and I,' the Doctor paused to get his bearings, picking out a new path through the weathered streets. 'The entire area is polluted with radical chronons. Whatever happened here destroyed Time Lord civilisation.'

The Doctor was sad. Shocked even. Kamelion could feel thoughts and emotions that the Doctor would not normally have shared with him. He _wanted_ Kamelion to know how he felt. What he was thinking. 'Civilisations rise and fall, Doctor. It is inevitable.'

'Yes, I know. But this is my civilisation, and I've become a witness to its end. That means I've become the last of the Time Lords, forced to roam alone in a universe where my people have been destroyed.'

'Even in the past.' Kamelion added

'Especially in the past. All the other Time Lords would have been synchronised with their home era.' The Doctor reached down, picking something up from amongst the rubble. Brushing carbon and dust away, he had found a book. A child's book. 'Only those that survived this cataclysm can interact with me now, and I happen to know that these ruins are billions of years old.'

'Then how are they so well preserved?'

'Stasis,' the Doctor explained, letting go of the battered book. It hung, suspended in the air, and in time. Kamelion shied away from the Doctor's thoughts as he pressed onwards again. 'Time is frozen here, except to us. Now I've moved the ruins inside the TARDIS, she can siphon away the pollution, use it to refuel.'

'And the matter?' Kamelion gestured towards the ruined city.

'Block transfer conversion.'

This was a concept Kamelion understood. 'I am a block transfer construct,' he said.

'Which is why you're immune to the stasis. The TARDIS will absorb most of these ruins into her structure, converting them from atomic to non-baryonic matter. Anything she finds indigestible will become a permanent fixture.'

'Indigestible?' Kamelion was uncertain what the Doctor could mean. 'Block transfer can be used to deconstruct any form of matter.'

'Matter yes,' the Doctor nodded, 'but it can't digest heisenberg radiation or its derivatives, and there are lots of heisenberg sources on Gallifrey. Especially over there,' he pointed towards the tallest of the city's ruined towers, 'beneath the Panopticon.'

'The Eye of Harmony?' Kamelion had heard of the Time Lords' power source, first in legends on Xeriphas, and later during his travels with the Master.

'Yes,' the Doctor nodded. 'This stasis field is the first line of defence, ensuring that only those already capable of time travel have access to the Eye. Although I never expected it to end up inside the TARDIS.'

'Will it be secure here?'

'Perfectly. The TARDIS shares many of the design features used to fix the Eye at the centre of the Web of Time. When all of this,' he gestured towards the surrounding terrain, 'has been digested, the TARDIS will relocate what it can't convert into energy.'

It took several minutes for them to cross the city, reaching the edge of the vast, statue-circled square that lay at the very heart of the former Capitol. Rising – spiralling – upwards from the centre of the city was the tower they had seen from afar, a twisting helix of dimensionally transcendental architecture that dwarfed any structure Kamelion had ever experienced. In close proximity he could see that the building was much larger than the city that had once contained it.

'So,' he asked, as they paused at the foot of the structure, 'why have you brought me here?'

'I prefer to work with an audience,' the Doctor explained. 'Tegan and Turlough wouldn't have survived the chronon bombardment.'

'So, I am your third choice?'

'Not at all.' The Doctor turned to look at Kamelion. To reassure him. 'I'm… struggling to find situations where you'll be safe. I want to help you, Kamelion. Really, I do.'

'I understand.'

'I hope you do,' the Doctor reached out, holding the android's arms. This act of reassurance, Kamelion realised, was for the Time Lord as much as it was for Kamelion. 'Now, help me to find out what happened here. Let's see if there's anything we can do.'

_Do?_ The Doctor said he had come here to learn before the city was absorbed by the TARDIS. Not to find a way to change history.

'You said that interference was forbidden.'

'It is,' the Doctor pulled away, turning back to look across towards the base of the Panopticon just a short walk away. 'But the alternative… being truly alone. I don't think I could live with that.'

'I understand.' Kamelion repeated. And he _did_ understand.

'It must be…' the Doctor realised they had found common ground. He stopped himself. 'How do you cope with being the last of your kind?'

Kamelion lowered his head. It was such a simple question, as was the answer.

'By bonding with my masters,' he replied, taking on a new physical form. 'Embracing their desires.'

In a burst of shining light, the mottled silver automaton was gone, replaced by a moment's fluid shape shifting, with the dark, bearded form of the Doctor's nemesis. The Master. Dressed as Kamelion had last seen him, in his guise as Sir Giles Estram.

'Of course, but I could never do that. Even on Earth I'm an outsider. And no matter how much you trust someone, you can never be certain of their motives. Not even mine.'

'Are you ever certain of your own motives, Doctor?' the Master asked.

'No. No, I'm not. Gallifrey is my home. I wander because… because I can always come home, like the prodigal… oh.'

They had come to within a few yards of the central tower, only to find that something else stood in its place. Another building superimposed over the one they had seen in the distance. The tower had been displaced, and in its place…

'What is that?'

'This is… _was_… the Panopticon, but a new structure's been superposited over the top. The one good thing about the Gallifreyan construction industry – all building and no demolition. Chances are that the entrance to the old Panopticon will be inside the new building. But why would they build over it?'

From the outside the new building resembled a short Greek temple raised up on a stepped platform. A dozen ionic columns separated the building proper from the rest of the city, and behind the four central columns a large statue could be seen.

'Perhaps it was built after Gallifrey had fallen and the Panopticon was no longer required,' said the Master. 'It looks much more recent, as if it was built after the city was devastated.'

'Perhaps.' The Doctor climbed the steps, drawing parallel with the columns. 'It looks like a museum of some kind, dedicated to someone very special. Don't you think it looks a little like the Lincoln Memorial?'

'Lincoln Memorial?' The Master stared up at the statue that sat before them. It was of a youthful man with tousled curls and sad eyes. 'What is that?'

'I'm sorry, Kamelion. It's an old Earth monument. Even the clothes match,' he gestured towards the Edwardian suit the statue wore. They were typical of Lincoln's period. 'Let's take a look inside shall we?'

Between the statue's legs there was a smooth, square doorway that led into the darkness. Passing into the chamber beyond, they came before a raised plinth inscribed with writing in three languages: Old High Gallifreyan, Ancient Greek, and English. A Rosetta Stone for human-Time Lord communication.

'Ah…'

'What is it?'

'This engraving. The Doctor pointed to the main inscription – the only part that hadn't been translated into English. 'It's my name. _The Doctor, Last Hero of Gallifrey, Bringer of the Nine Deaths_. This…' he waved his arms and circled the chamber, 'is me.'

'You?' The Master turned to read the inscription aloud.

'No, no.' The Doctor closed his hands over his ears and scrunched up his eyes until his companion stopped speaking, 'I shouldn't know about this.'

'So, we leave?'

'No,' the Doctor stood, facing up to his fears. 'We go on. Follow me.'

Walking past the platform and its inscriptions, they passed into a wide chamber subdivided into alcoves. Each alcove was presided over by a statue, beyond which lay a selection of artefacts, a chronograph player, and a backdrop filled with text. Again, each one was in three languages.

'So,' asked the Kamelion-Master, 'what are these statues?'

'Me… my other selves,' said the Doctor. 'It's like an exhibition of my life. That one –' he pointed towards the first of the statues. It was a tall gentleman, older and sterner than the one outside, but similarly attired, and with a similar length of hair '– was the first me. The original.'

Looking up into the old man's eyes, Kamelion shifted, adopting the shape of the first Doctor. Where the statue was of dark marble, Kamelion filled in the colours, drawing them from the Doctor's mind.

Tugging at the lapels of his frock coat, the Kamelion-Doctor moved across to the next statue.

'And this?' He became shorter and scruffier as he adopted the second Doctor's shape.

'Number two,' said the Doctor, walking past the chronograph to look at the backdrop that lay beyond. 'And here… a transcript of my trial. Edited by the looks of it.'

Moving on, they came to a third statue.

'This was my punishment…' the Doctor explained. 'My third body. Considering it was forced on me it wasn't too bad. Happy times.'

'Doctor…?' Kamelion had moved on to the next statue, where he soon found himself wrestling with a long and unfamiliar scarf.

'It's alright, Kamelion. This is Doctor number four. My most recent body.' He looked up. It wasn't so long ago that he had been staring at that face in a mirror. It was an odd sensation. 'They could have shown me smiling at least. I was always smiling…'

Behind him, Kamelion grinned a toothy grin as he stood before the next statue. 'This I recognise.'

'Hmm,' the Doctor joined him, looking up at a representation of himself. The hair was a little shorter though – perhaps he was due a trim in the near future. 'I'm not sure I should look any further. Let's…'

Instead of turning away, he looked at the next statue. He flinched.

'Commander Maxil?' The Doctor looked surprised. 'I suppose he doesn't look so bad with the scowl removed.'

Kamelion moved deeper into the alcove, stopping to read through the text on the backdrop. 'He appears to be the most revered of your forms. "The Doctor that came home, resumed the Presidency, and who steered Gallifrey through hard times like the captain of a ship." '

'So,' the Doctor turned to join his companion, moving the android's long scarf aside to read the text for himself, 'I'm still President by the time I regenerate. That's interesting to know.'

The Doctor took his time over the display. He seemed quite pleased with what he found, and his mood had lightened as they moved on to the next incarnation. Pausing to take in his seventh body, the Doctor paused at the chronograph, looking down into the viewer that could instantly relay matrix records directly into the brain at the flick of a switch.

The Doctor flicked the switch. A moment later he recoiled as his brain processed the raw data.

'Oh, dear,' he said.

'What is it?' asked Kamelion, who was shape shifting into a new form. Short and rumpled again, but not quite right. Without a reference from the Doctor's mind the android found it difficult to capture the seventh Doctor's proper form.

'Death's Champion?' The Doctor murmured. 'How could that have happened?'

Standing beside the Doctor, Kamelion leaned over and stared into the viewer. As he did so he adopted the right colours and the right accent for this darkest of the Doctor's forms.

'According to this you made the ultimate sacrifice at the end of your sixth life,' he said in a gentle Scottish burr, 'and that after your regeneration you restored the Rule of Rassilon,' he rolled his r's, 'stepping aside for your granddaughter to rule instead.'

'Yes,' the Doctor seemed distracted. 'Susan…?' The chronograph had shown several images of Susan – _his_ Susan. The Doctor's thoughts were of a much younger woman. But, Kamelion noted, although she was many years older there was no sign that she had regenerated.

'She died trying to redeem you. Giving herself to death as a means of nullifying your contract.'

'Contract? What contract? Let me see that again…' the Doctor returned to the viewer, pressing the button and absorbing the record all over again. This time, he didn't pull away until the record had ended. 'I made a contract with Death? This can't be right.'

'What about this?' The Scottish Doctor called over from the last alcove, where he tapped at the final statue with his umbrella. It was the eighth Doctor, his tousled hair and sad face a mirror of the seated giant that rested at the entrance to the memorial.

'My last body?' The Doctor moved to the backdrop, reading aloud. '_"Purged of darkness, he tried and failed to save Gallifrey, but like his predecessor, the home world had become tainted, corrupt. Nine times he tried to save it, and nine times he was forced to sacrifice it"._'

'It's me. I'm what destroys Gallifrey.' The Doctor backed away from the alcoves, clearly aghast. 'I'm going to be the one responsible.'

'Doctor?' Kamelion was concerned. He could feel the anger and the darkness inside the Time Lord's mind. More than that, he could hear his thoughts, process his intentions, embrace his desires.

And from inside Kamelion's own mind, another voice, a whisper, reinforced the Doctor's thoughts, turning them into a clear set of instructions which the android was compelled to follow.

As the Doctor stood beside him, looking up at the legend of his future, the replica of his seventh body reached across, throwing him backwards and onto his back. Before he could react, his dark facsimile was upon him.

The Doctor found himself pinned to the ground, his throat caught in the vice-like grip of an android. He also found himself staring into the deep, blue eyes of his successor.

'Die, Doctor, Die!' Kamelion rasped, pressing his thumbs deep into the soft flesh of the Doctor's throat.


	3. Chapter 3

'Kamelion!' The Doctor hissed through gritted teeth. 'Stop this…'

The android paused for a moment. The Doctor's dark thoughts were changing… receding. But as they did so the other voice grew stronger, rising from a subtle whisper into a barked command. _Kill the Doctor, Kamelion. Kill him now._

His master's voice was strong. Compelling. But the Doctor wanted to live. He was willing his respiratory bypass into action.

'_Kamelion,' _he gasped,_ 'I order you to stop!_''

_Kill him._ The voice urged, and Kamelion continued to squeeze.

_Stop._ The Doctor's voice echoed through his head. His feeble robot mind had become a battleground for two opposing wills, and inside, Kamelion screamed. Staring down into the Doctor's eyes, he caught a glimpse of his own reflection. His present form. He wasn't the seventh Doctor any longer, he was the Master again.

The Master's voice receded. Metal hands unclenched as the android resumed his natural shape.

'You… wanted to kill yourself, Doctor. You willed me to do it.'

The Doctor gulped in air, perching himself up as he rubbed his rapidly bruising throat.

'That isn't what I was thinking.' He said hoarsely. 'Not me as I am now. I was thinking of my future. It needs to be changed.'

Confused, Kamelion helped the Doctor to his feet. 'I do not understand.'

Dusting down his beige coat, the Doctor patted Kamelion's shoulder reassuringly, but the android knew he had done wrong.

'What should I do?'

'Nothing,' the Doctor said, crossing over to the platform at the front of the exhibition. It was about ten feet square and equally high. 'No, wait, come over here.'

Kamelion joined the Doctor, who gestured for him to grip the side of the platform.

'If this is based on the Lincoln Memorial, then there should be something that I need underneath here. Do you think you can move it?

'Not in this form,' Kamelion said, changing shape and gaining height and mass.

Towering above the stone platform there now stood a creature of myth. A green troll or ogre in tattered purple pants stood in his place, some ten feet high and almost the same across. Digging its blunt fingertips into the cracking, splintering stone, it slowly heaved the mass aside. Beneath the platform was a small recess just large enough for a man to jump into.

The Doctor jumped.

'What are you doing?' Kamelion asked in a gruff, hulkish voice.

Bending down, the Doctor hefted up a small casket, about three feet by two. Sliding it onto the floor and across to his companion.

'Here,' he said, 'open this.'

'What is that?' The casket was made of rough stone and bore the seal of Rassilon, legendary founder of the Time Lords. 'Your remains?'

'No. They don't bury Time Lords. They absorb our bodies back into the looms and recycle us. At least they used to.'

Kamelion reached down, pushing hard against the sides of the box until it popped in a cloud of dust. Taking over, the Doctor separated the broken casket and reached inside, drawing out a slender tube some twelve inches in length. It seemed to contain a swirling plasma or liquid. Kamelion couldn't quite work out what it was, but whatever the tube contained was constantly shifting and swirling under its own power.

'What are you planning to do with that?'

'I'm going to do what I was thinking about when you tried to kill me. I'm going to change my personal history.'

Hoisting himself out of the recess, the Doctor beckoned Kamelion to follow as he half-walked, half-ran outside the Memorial and across the square beyond.

It took what felt like several minutes to retrace their path through the city and across the landscape that the Doctor had christened "The Blue Room". Stepping back into the TARDIS corridor, the Doctor led Kamelion – who was again in his familiar silver form – back to the console room.

It was white again, and much of the console had repaired itself, with a gleaming time rotor ready to respond to the flick of a switch. But not the one the Doctor now depressed. A door swished across the entrance to the corridor and a lock clicked somewhere.

'What are we doing, Doctor? What about Tegan and Turlough?'

'Don't worry. Thanks to the stasis field we've only been gone a couple of minutes.'

Kamelion looked towards the locked corridor door. It seemed that the Doctor still wanted to be alone.

'Just a precaution,' the Doctor explained, 'I moved those rooms a _very_ long way away.

Now, there are some things I'll need you to do.'

The Doctor leaned forwards, reaching for Kamelion's umbilical. Drawing some slack, he plugged it into the TARDIS databank before typing furiously into the keypad. As he did so,

Kamelion cocked his head, trying to see what instructions the Doctor was giving him. When that failed he tried to sense the Doctor's thoughts, but this time they were closed to him.

Moving over to the console's navigational panel, the Time Lord began inputting codes and calculating vectors with blinding speed.

'Are we leaving?' Kamelion asked.

'No need,' the Doctor shook his head. 'I'm setting up an interstitial motive bridge into the past. The TARDIS will stay in the same time and place, but the real-world interface I'm creating at the end of the bridge will emerge at a completely different location. I'm drawing down as much mass from the Blue Room as I can, mapping a physical tunnel onto the vortex.'

As the Doctor spoke, an archway appeared in one of the walls. It led into a narrow corridor which ended with a simple door.

'It's forbidden of course,' the Doctor explained, 'but right now I'm the Highest Authority. So, as custodian of the Laws of Time, I hereby authorise myself to use any and every means possible blah, blah, and so on, and so forth.'

Flicking a final switch, the Doctor dashed out of the room, passing under the arch and closing the short distance towards the door.

'Come on, Kamelion,' he called, 'Tegan and Turlough won't even notice we've been gone.'

Intrigued, the android made his way towards the Doctor. 'Where are we going?'

'Prison.'

The Doctor opened the door, stepping out into a small brick cell. Following him inside, Kamelion noted the cramped conditions. A small window, a single door, a simple toilet and a bed.

'You're imprisoning yourself to prevent you from causing future harm? Will I share your solitude?'

'Of course not,' the Doctor reassured him, 'this is Stangmoor Prison. I came here for something. Tell me, do you sense the Master?'

'The Master? I don't…' Kamelion opened his mind, searching for a powerful contact. But there was nothing. Other than the Doctor's the minds were weak here. 'No, he is not here.'

'Excellent! He should be busying himself in China at the moment. Now the next part is very important. I want you to look into my mind. I'm going to focus on an image, and I want you to assume that form. Can you do that?'

Kamelion nodded, concentrating on the Doctor's thoughts. The Time Lord was remembering a man. Shorter than the Doctor. Familiar. _The Master_. Not Kamelion's Master though, but another, earlier, incarnation.

'That's perfect,' the Doctor commented, taking in the dark, grey-flecked hair and beard, the Nehru suit, and the satanic features. Reaching forwards, he checked the details on the security pass that Kamelion had fabricated. 'Now, if anybody asks, you are Professor Emil Keller, and you're here to see Professor Kettering. I'm your assistant, and we're here to add a new component to the Keller Processor.'

Drawing a lump of scrap circuitry from one of his pockets, the Doctor pressed it into Kamelion's black-gloved hands. 'I want you to say whatever comes into my head.'

Pulling open the cell door, the Doctor glanced up and down the corridor before giving his companion the all-clear. Together they made their way, unchallenged, towards the prison's medical wing, where the Doctor quickly located a door labelled 'Processing Room'.

'This is it,' he whispered, gently easing the door open. 'Hello?'

It was a well-lit laboratory, with several pale formica tables set against black-boarded walls. At the far end of the room was a desk, at the end of which was a chair equipped with restraints, much like an executioner's chair. To its left was a trolley, on which a large, complex device rested.

'Hello?' A middle-aged scientist in a white lab-coat was sitting at the desk. 'Oh,' it looked like he had been completing a set of notes before he looked up from his work, 'Professor Keller. This is most unexpected, I heard you were away.'

Rising to greet Kamelion and the Doctor, the scientist brushed against his notes, knocking them to the floor. Flustered, he hastily began gathering the papers together.

'Professor Kettering?' Kamelion said, testing out his new identity. 'I was, but certain matters came to my attention. I had to leave my assistant, Chen Li, behind. This,' he paused to introduce the Doctor, is…'

'Seamoth, Trent Seamoth.' For some reason, the Doctor was smirking. Helping Kettering to retrieve his papers, he offered a hand, shaking it vigorously. 'I've heard so much about you, Professor.'

'Oh, yes. I must have missed the call from security.'

'Nothing to worry about,' said Kamelion-Keller, 'I just wanted to show Seamoth here how to recalibrate my machine.' He held up the scrap of circuitry that the Doctor had passed to him. 'We need to upgrade the analog limiter.'

'Of course, of course.' Kettering held out his hand to take the circuit. 'May I…?'

'Er… I'm so sorry, Professor Kettering,' said the Doctor, pushing the gathered papers back into the Professor's hands, 'but we're on a tight schedule. Do you have the spectrographic log?'

'Yes, yes,' Kettering looked around, trying to spot the requested paperwork before realising it was elsewhere. 'It's in my office.'

'Do be so kind as to fetch it for us then, Professor,' said Keller. 'There's a good fellow.'

'Certainly. I'll get them right away.'

Kettering excused himself, heading out of the room and towards his office.

'Good work, Kamelion,' said the Doctor, patting his shoulder. 'That should give us four or five minutes, but we should be done in three.'

Crossing over to the trolley at the far end of the room, the Doctor started to familiarise himself with its design.

'What is it?' Kamelion asked.

'It's called the Keller Machine.' The Doctor explained, running his eyes and fingers over the device. 'It's being touted as a revolutionary new way of treating psychotic criminals. There's a mind parasite inside that literally sucks the evil out of a man's brain.'

'And in reality?'

'It's based on a device from Gallifrey's Dark Times. When the Time Lords were first created they were susceptible to madness. Their brains couldn't cope with the stress of long life. If a Time Lord stayed in the same body for more than a thousand years he'd start to go mad. That's why we change our bodies when we regenerate. It renews the synapses and releases all that pent-up paradox, which the TARDIS absorbs and diverts back into its engines.'

'So what is this machine for?'

'Well, before the new body idea they came up with this. It's a siphon. The parasite is a psychic leech bred to suck up all the dark thoughts and emotions hidden in the darkest corners of our minds. When we mastered regeneration the madness was delayed by up to ten thousand years. The leeches were all but redundant, and eventually became extinct, so goodness knows where the Master found it.'

'And the machine?'

'The processor amplifies the parasite's power and allows the dark thoughts to be re-focused. Broadcast. He can do to many what you've already felt him do to you.'

'I see,' Kamelion watched uncomfortably as the Doctor pulled on a pair of rubber gloves and picked up a set of tongs from a nearby bench. 'If this parasite is so powerful why didn't I sense it? Am I safe?'

'When it's not attached to the processor the parasite's a touch telepath, and you can't sense it because it hasn't absorbed any minds yet. The Master won't be testing it out for… oh… another week. More than enough time for me to steal the parasite and for him to find a new one.'

Moving over to the Keller Machine, the Doctor slid open a metal panel and reached inside. Finding a large jar of some kind, he gently unscrewed it, withdrawing an open container from the guts of the machine. Inside, Kamelion could see a slick, black, slug-like creature. Pulling out a plastic bag, he lowered the tongs into the jar and gripped the parasite. It squirmed as the Doctor dropped it into the bag and tied it off.

'Now,' said the Doctor, slipping the parasite into one of his pockets, 'let's get out of here.'


	4. Chapter 4

The last time Tegan was in the library it had, quite literally, been falling about around her ears. The TARDIS had been in its death-throes. The stakes where high, and the situation was grim. Now, after a longer than usual journey through the TARDIS corridors, she stepped into a shifting scene.

The first thing she noticed was that there were no books. The bare walls had repaired themselves, and row upon row of half-formed bookcases appeared to be materializing, much as the TARDIS did when it landed in a new location.

The empty white shelves seemed to be assuming the shape of a single spiral, like the inside of a conch-shell. Uncertain if it was safe to cross the threshold, she stepped into the room, stamping on the floor to make sure it was solid.

Crossing over to the nearest shelf, Tegan put her arm into the cavity and waved it about. Definitely no books. _Typical_.

As she huffed and cussed, Tegan noticed a change. She got goose bumps as the air seemed to charge itself, and her hair stood on end. Before her eyes the white, ghostly outlines of a shelf full of books started to appear.

As she watched, the washed-out images solidified, their spines filled with colour and their embossed titles became legible. She reached up randomly, pulling out a book and hefting it about. It was a big volume of maybe a thousand pages, but it was as light as a slice of polystyrene. _Was_ being the operative word.

As she held the book its mass increased, forcing her to grip it with two hands before slumping to rest it against her chest.

'Rabbits,' she cursed, struggling to ease the book back up into the right shelf-space. 'Transdi-bloody-mensional physics. Gah!'

With the book back in place, Tegan looked to where the spiralling shelves turned a corner. They were all now crammed full of books, meticulously ordered in a way that only the TARDIS databank might manage. Moments later she could smell them. Not dust – the library was spotless – but the different smells of paper and string and ink and glue. Fresh smells.

'Right,' she started to walk down the curving aisle, picking out the nearest titles, all began with Zz-. 'F,' she muttered. She had a fair walk ahead of her.


	5. Chapter 5

Elsewhere inside the TARDIS, the Doctor closed of the archway that led back to Stangmoor Prison. With a flick of a switch he jettisoned the bridge into the vortex and unlocked the doors. He also reset the length of the corridors that led to his private quarters and to the library.

'Tegan and Turlough should be back any moment,' he said, handing the plastic bag to Kamelion. 'I want you to take this to my laboratory. I'll join you in a minute or two.'

The silver robot nodded, delicately taking the bag and carrying it out of the console room at arms length. As he did so, Turlough passed him in the doorway. He had a blank canvass and a set of charcoal pencils under his arm.

'What's up with him?' he asked as the android disappeared down the corridor.

'Oh, Kamelion offered to dispose of some melted circuits,' the Doctor explained, pulling a duster from his pocket and dabbing at the shiny new surface of the power systems panel.

Turlough whistled. 'Didn't take you long to get the TARDIS fixed,' he said, taking in the features of the new room.

'Oh, she does most of the work herself,' the Doctor explained. 'There are still a few tweaks I have to make. You go on ahead and I'll catch you up.'

'Where's Tegan?'

'She's gone to get a book. If you see her first, tell her I'll be along shortly.'

And with that, the Doctor slipped out of the control room.


	6. Chapter 6

Tegan ran her fingers over the dust-jacket of her newly discovered book. The ghostly yellow eyes and deep red lips of Daisy Buchanan were superimposed over a night-time city scene, with bright bursts of yellow light breaking through the darkness. _The Great Gatsby_. _F. Scott-Fitzgerald_. She opened the book and read the name of the publisher on the dust jacket. _Charles Scribners' Sons_. Trust the TARDIS to stock up with a first edition. Aunt Vanessa would have been so jealous.

Clasping the book to her chest, Tegan dashed out of the library. Now she had a decent read she was keen to join the Doctor and Turlough. See if this planet really was as relaxing as the Doctor had made out. As she scurried along the corridor, Tegan briefly spotted Kamelion some way ahead. He was at a T-Junction, heading away from the control room. And he was walking suspiciously, holding a package in front of him and at arm's length. The way her ex-flatmate Allie had used to carry a stinky nappy. On a whim, and because she'd never really felt comfortable about the android, Tegan decided to follow him.

The android didn't get very far before he entered one of the TARDIS laboratories. Uncertain of how good his senses were, Tegan sneaked up to the open door, sidling up to the edge so that she could peek inside.

Kamelion was preoccupied. He had placed the strange bag down in the middle of a table, disappearing from sight for a few moments. Drawing back, Tegan was surprised to see the bag move. She gasped.

Returning to the bag, Kamelion tore it open and deposited its contents into a large, broad dish. A thick, dark blob landed into the dish, quivering like jelly. To Tegan it resembled a giant sea anemone. As the android continued his mysterious preparations, his back moved to obscure her view. Stretching up onto her toes, Tegan strained for a better look when –

'Ahem.'

She gasped.

Standing behind her, the Doctor had a quizzical expression on his face as she dropped her book with a thud.

'You scared the living daylights out of me,' she whispered.

'What are you doing, Tegan,' he asked, 'and why are we whispering?'

'Shh,' she pointed into the laboratory, 'it's Kamelion. He's up to something.'

The Doctor glanced over Tegan's shoulder, where he could clearly see Kamelion following his instructions, wiring up an old exitonic circuit board to a passive mind probe.

'Ah. I'm afraid he's helping me tie up a couple of loose ends from our visit to the Crystal Bucephalus.'

'Loose ends?' She said loudly, sighing with relief. 'Fixing the TARDIS you mean?'

'Amongst other things. I didn't want to bother you and Turlough. You both need a rest.'

'So what are the other things? And what's that sludgy thing Kamelion's got? Looks like bad sushi.'

'More like bad karma, I'm afraid, Tegan.' The Doctor ushered her into the room, where Kamelion turned towards them, the usual blank expression on his face.

'Is everything alright, Doctor?' he asked.

'Yes, Kamelion. It's fine.' He glanced across at the dish. 'It looks like the parasite's out of the bag.'

'Parasite?' Tegan remained confused.

'That,' the Doctor pointed to the thing in the dish. 'Mind parasite. Perfectly safe so long as you keep your fingers to yourself. Here,' he held out a slender tube, 'hold this.'

'What is it?' Tegan took the proffered object. It was quite long and slim, and she was surprised she hadn't noticed the Doctor holding it. Then again, he had had one arm behind his back.

'My biodata.' Tegan remained unenlightened. 'You know I have multiple bodies?' She nodded. 'Well that's because I have thirteen sets of genetic and experiential information coded into my body. This…' he tapped the tube she was holding, 'is an extract. The Time Lords keep a copy connected to the Matrix for as long as a Time Lord is alive. It's their way of being one step ahead. They use it to predict what we will do in the future.'

'That's terrible…' Tegan began, 'but, hang on. You're still alive. So how…'

'It's from my future. I recently found out that when I get older I'm going to make some bad choices.'

_That sounds ominous_, she thought. 'What sort of bad choices?'

'Mistakes. As they get older, Time Lords become prone to madness. Usually around the tenth body, although if you're overexposed to the forces of paradox it can strike much sooner.'

Tegan responded with her finest blank look. She suspected this was just one of those loose ends that were way over her head, but the Doctor carried on anyway.

'I found out that the madness will strike me a little earlier, and that I'm destined to destroy Gallifrey.'

_Gallifrey?_ She recalled that that was the name of the Doctor's home planet.

'Crikey. That's serious.'

'Very,' the Doctor agreed. 'Kamelion here's going to help me stop the madness.'

'With the sushi?'

'That's right. I'm going to use it to siphon off my darkest thoughts. If I do it now the madness will be delayed by a few lives. Instead of my seventh self going crazy, he'll be able to resist the corruption and make the right choices. And that should be enough to keep my future selves out of trouble.'

'And these dark thoughts of yours?' Tegan kind of understood. 'The parasite eats them?'

Again the Doctor nodded. 'Any thoughts the parasite consumes become its own. An evil, twisted version of my mind. The antithesis of everything I stand for.'

'Right. So it soaks up all your bad vibes, and then we squish it?'

'No. Squishing it,' he used the expression distastefully, 'would be wrong. The parasite is a blank slate at the moment, but once it absorbs my thoughts it becomes a part of me. I need to put that part back inside my head where it can do no harm.'

'Hang on. You're taking it out and putting it back again? What's the point?'

'The Doctor is moving it, Tegan,' said Kamelion, keen to play a part in the exchange. 'Things that happen in a hundred years will be delayed by a thousand. Instead of the seventh Doctor doing bad things, it will be the last Doctor who goes mad. The twelfth.'

'Or thirteenth,' the Doctor corrected him, 'it's not an exact science.'

'But you'll still be a bad guy in the future? Is that how the Master ended up… you know.' She twirled her finger in the air. 'I mean, what kind of life is that to look forward to?'

'I don't think it will come to that, Tegan,' he took the biodata extract from her, passing it to Kamelion, who starting wiring it up to the exitonic circuit board. 'There's a good chance that I won't live beyond my eighth life. Something big will happen then. I'll die before my dark side ever surfaces.'

'Oh, right,' she felt awkward, not knowing what to say. _He's talking hundred of years from now, not tomorrow._ 'That's good to know.'

'No, it isn't. Kamelion has to make the changes, and when he's done I won't remember a thing. The truth will be buried.'

'But I'll know.' The news hurt Tegan. Typical of the Doctor to try and shove the really important stuff under the carpet when her back was turned. 'One question. How can you trust Kamelion but not me? I mean, Turlough I can understand, but…'

'I didn't want you or Turlough involved. What you didn't know couldn't have hurt you. But now that you do…'

'What?' Angry Tegan had something to say. 'You'll wipe my memories?'

'Not exactly,' the Doctor looked hurt. 'I was going to say you can help. Rewriting biodata is a delicate process. Not like brain surgery. Every experience I've ever had, every memory, and every person I've ever met, is part of what's about to be changed. Whatever memories I lose, you'll lose too.'

'So you _are_ going to wipe my memories!'

'Time will do that for us. History heals itself all the time. That's nature, not me.'

'So I'll forget all this?'

The Doctor shrugged. 'It depends how successful we are. Only Kamelion and the TARDIS will know everything that happens. And I trust the TARDIS implicitly.'

'Okay,' she reminded herself it was the Doctor who was in most danger from all of this, not her feelings. 'So what do you want me to do?'

'Well,' the Doctor moved over to inspect the silver android's handiwork. 'Kamelion's completed the circuit between the parasite and the biodata extract.' He prodded at the circuit board with a small tester, which winked green in response to his prods. 'All I need is for you to hold my hand and close your eyes.

'Yeah, right,' she said, taking his hand. 'A delicate process. Not like brain surgery at all.'

Smiling reassuringly at Tegan, the Doctor poked his finger into the top of the mind parasite.


	7. Chapter 7

The Doctor and his companions were gone. Off on another adventure, leaving Kamelion behind to contemplate his existence.

_At least_, he thought, _this time I have a function_.

The Doctor's timeline was synchronized and the TARDIS repaired. Tegan and the Doctor had left happy and oblivious to the secrets they had left in his safe keeping. Only he, Kamelion, and the TARDIS, now knew about the Blue Room. Against all the odds the Doctor had given him another chance.

From his vantage point at the foot of the ruined Panopticon, the android stared across the landscape. Its sharper features had already started to blur as the TARDIS siphoned away the bluffs and crags that surrounded the old Capitol. Elsewhere in the TARDIS, power reserves were rising and new rooms were being formed.

He turned, stepping back into the ghostly Monument. In his hand, he carried the Doctor's biodata extract. Rewritten. Refreshed.

In front of him stood the platform he had moved aside during his last visit. Unlike the outside, the interior of the Memorial was as sharply defined as he remembered. The deep finger marks and splintered stone hadn't smoothed like the ruins outside.

_Perhaps,_ Kamelion thought, _there's a lot of heisenberg radiation here, and this place will never be displaced. Or perhaps the TARDIS is absorbing matter from the edges, working its way in._

Whatever the answer, he circled the platform and found the broken box that had, until recently, been buried underneath. Placing the slender tube to one side, Kamelion picked up the box, split asunder by the brute strength of his previous form. This time, he concentrated, establishing a psychic link with the TARDIS.

_Contact._

Kamelion started to glow with the shining aura that presaged his transformations. This time, however, it wasn't Kamelion whose shape shifted. It was the box. Through Kamelion, the TARDIS was repairing it. Momentarily, the intact box clicked open, and the android set it down upon the ground, lifting the lid and staring at what lay inside. A bed of exitonic circuitry surrounded the tube-shaped cavity.

Kamelion picked up the extract and returned it to its rightful place, completing whatever circuit sat inside the box. As he closed the lid and set it back beneath the platform, the exhibition flooded with white light. Shielding his eyes, Kamelion turned towards the alcoves to see what changes had been wrought.

At a glance he could see few changes to the first five exhibits. Each Doctor resembled what he had seen before. The sixth and seventh Doctor looked similar, but there were subtle differences – different clothes, different backdrop texts.

As the Doctor had requested, Kamelion stared into the seventh chronographic viewer and watched.

_If Susan is still in danger, you know what to do. _They were the Doctor's orders, input directly into his artificial brain. _If not, forget what you have seen._

The android processed what he saw, and then moved on. He turned towards the statue of the eighth Doctor. It was the same. Whatever changes had been made to the sixth and seventh Doctors' lives, it had had little impact on the life of the last Doctor.

Except that he wasn't the last.

There were more alcoves, set aside for the ninth, tenth, and future doctors. He turned to examine them, but stopped. _Don't look beyond my seventh life_. _Not this time. Return the extract and leave. Don't look back._

Kamelion obeyed, returning from whence he came. Somewhere in the darkness, between the twelfth and thirteenth alcoves, he thought he could hear dark laughter.


	8. Chapter 8

_The Darkest Corner_ is dedicated to the memory of Craig Hinton, whose friendship and encouragement have been a constant thoughout my time writing fiction in the Doctor Who universe.

When we first met, Craig had just written _The Crystal Bucephalus_, and was struggling with the synopsis of _Millennial Rites_. It was while talking about our respective fiction that I introduced him to the concept of quantum mnemonics, and idea that had featured in two of my own submissions to Virgin – _The Fugue_ (intended as the last sixth Doctor/Rani story), and _The Dark Tide_ (a second Doctor/Blackbeard "histrionical").

Craig championed my Blackbeard story, which got as close to acceptance as I ever managed, and later supported my editorial endeavours in the world of the fanzine.

Ten years later we were reunited by a yahoo group, picking up where we had left off, and bouncing crazy, crazy ideas off each other like 1993 was yesterday. I was a reluctant returnee to Doctor Who fandom, but Craig often egged me on, inspiring me to write my first complete Doctor Who novel as a dare. That novel, still in its first draft, was called _Blink of an Eye_. The dare from Craig was a challenge for me to "outfanwank" him – to write as good a novel as I could, with more continuity in it than even he had managed.

I did it, and my last conversation with Craig was an enthusiastic one – he loved the story and wanted to meet up and talk about some of his own ideas of how the second draft might work, and how we might sneak a couple of references in from his own unpublished novel, _Time's Champion_. We were planning to get together about two weeks before Christmas 2006 – this turned out to be two weeks after he died, so the meeting never happened, and I'll never know what he had to say to me.

Now it's my turn to repay some of Craig's friendship. _The Darkest Corner_ is my unashamedly continuity-laden homage to Craig. Set immediately after _The Crystal Bucephalus_, it throws as many of his favourite concepts together – Kamelion, the Valeyard, the ruins of Gallifrey, the sixth Doctor's great potential, ancient Time Lord history and a gratuitous sequel to a classic Pertwee-Delgado confrontation.

I happen to think Craig's forte was short-story writing, and I hope, in some small way, _The Darkest Corner_ does him justice.

_The Darkest Corner_ and other tributes to the memory of Craig Hinton will be published in _Shelf Life_, a fan anthology edited by David McIntee, Adrian Middleton and Jay Eales. For more information visit thefanthology 


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